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Friday, December 25, 2015

I used the Sara Lawson (Sew Sweetness website) pattern for her Tudor Bag (that I won as part of a prize from one of the Finish Along quarters of this year) to make this bag for my mum for Christmas...

- she had asked for a bag with short handles and this was a good chance to try out this pattern. It was my first time adding a zip pocket on the front and a zip placket at the top. I have also never used stiff Soft and Stable foam as wadding (it's just so expensive here...)

There are four inner pockets, attached to the lining....

It was a slightly more difficult construction method from my usual style of bag but I managed to put it altogether in a couple of days (in between Christmas shopping/chores)...phew!

Saturday, December 19, 2015

I don't know who will end up with this single bed quilt but as soon as I saw this gorgeous dark pink and grey Kimmi fabric at Spotlight at the beginning of the year I knew I had to pair it up with the charcoal pinstripe and come up with a quilt.

I raided my stash for some more pinks, only having to add a couple of new bought ones to give some variety in tones.

The pattern is from a layer cake recipe (though I used yardage) by 1+2=Easy by Samelia's Mum and it certainly was easy. I added top and bottom borders to add in more pink and to make it bigger (47.5" x 66").

Did you spot him in any of the photos above?

For the binding I used the dark pink and white polka dot fabric that appears in the quilt. The backing is made with a lovely deep pink spring blossom print as well as a white and pink version of the Kimmi fabric.

I have kept the quilting fairly simple with just some inner borders on the outsides of the square in square blocks, and a free-motion chrysanthemum flower inside each of the small squares; the large Kimmi blocks just have diagonal criss-cross lines as I wanted to keep it all quite soft.

The top and bottom borders have diagonal lines that created diamond effects so I put a flower inside each diamond as well to echo what happened further up.

And, as always when I do an outside shoot, my two four-legged friends had to be right there in the action...

May 2016 - SOLD! Bought for her half-Japanese niece by my 'sister-in-law' Julia, who spotted it in the quilt display (aka the 'done pile' on the spare bed) when visiting for lunch after travelling down from the North Island for the Bluff Oyster Festival.

Friday, December 11, 2015

Photo taken in front of 'Room 2' where Mrs A has spent most of her time.

I put together this lap quilt for my darling colleague Lucy Anderson, retiring from teaching after a stellar career, with more than 30 years at our school, most famously working with the junior pupils for the majority of that time.

The famous-in-Edendale Mrs A of Team Kiwi in Room 2.

I asked many past and current pupils, staff-members and Board of Trustees chairpersons to write messages for Lucy and sewed them altogether in this quilt.

People wrote their messages with pencil and I wrote over-top with permanent fabric pens before sewing the squares together last weekend.

It was so cool to collect up all the messages and read the different memories,

comments or quotes that everyone came up with!

It has been an absolute pleasure to work alongside this gorgeous lady and to learn from her about how to conduct oneself as a professional and a facilitator of learning. Lucy has been a fantastic role-model and supporter for all of us at the school.

The quilt measures approx 58" sq and is made with fabric range 'Singing the Blues' from Spotlight.
It is a square-in-square design, based on a pattern called 'Vanilla Romance' that was
printed in magazine 'Handmade' Vol 29 No 5 2011

The backing was made from the leftovers of the different fabrics
plus yardage of the blue peacock-feather style fabric (seen at top of photo).
I used a large all over stipple in the body of the quilt, with wavy lines in the border.